We can talk until we are blue in the face about whether people will pay for news or not. Talk is cheap. Actions are not. So I’m eager to see the experiments begin.

Wilson’s not being sarcastic. He’s more optimistic than most future positives about content sites finding a way to charge their readers, and even has his own vision a “freemium model” he thinks might work (“I like the model where the more frequent a visitor is, the more is required of them”). Still, he wonders if there are models that will work for every online node of Murdochworld.

It’s not clear to me that newspapers like The Sun, The Times, and The Post will be able to make the WSJ’s model work. And that’s what interests me. What will News Corp do for those properties? And will it work?

Others are not so careful. At the Guardian, Jeff Jarvis says, not for the first time:

Newspapers have had 15 years since the launch of the internet browser to reimagine and rebuild themselves for the reality of the post-Gutenberg age. But they didn’t. Now they are trying to reclaim old business models for a new media economy — a link economy, I call it, in which links give content value. Cut yourself off from links, behind pay walls, and you cut yourself off from the internet and its real value.

The old business model – cover price plus ad revenue – is bust: blown apart by the loss of classified to online networks and collapse of cover-price revenue due to falling sales. The hoped-for cash from online advertising has not materialised, at least not on the scale that would support the kind of journalism practised by the likes of Murdoch’s papers, or for that matter the Guardian.

At Techdirt, Mike Masnick offers three reasons why he thinks Murdoch will fail.

1. [The] other sites [in Murdoch’s network] don’t have the qualities that make some people willing to pay for the WSJ. The quality isn’t as good and the direct monetary benefit is not nearly as clear.

2. Most of those other sites have much clearer (free) competition.

3. Nowhere at all does Murdoch talk about actually giving people a reason to buy. All he’s saying is that if they put up a paywall, people will pay. Sure, a few might, but it’s a small number, and doing so will stagnate any sort of growth, piss off advertisers, and allow competitors to take a giant leap forward — all in one shot.

Professional Murdoch chronicler Michael Wolff says the publisher’s paywall plan will be an “uphill fight,” and “probably even greater than it might appear” because both Murdoch and his company are so techno-backward.

Not only is he, among all media executives, the most technically disinclined (actually, totally illiterate), but his company, of all the big media enterprise, is the most technically backward and maladroit. He may now employ more reporters than anyone else in the world, but they use the oldest computers. He may have some of the world’s most trafficked news sites, but they are also the slowest and most inept. Technology, at News Corp., has always been regarded as one of those things, like fancy hotels, or long-form writing, that are not part of the company culture.

Murdoch’s pronouncement is but one of several big-foot moves of late as the major media players choose sides in the great pay-versus-free grudge match. Late last month the Associated Press, a key member of the Pay Up! team, introduced a much-criticized and somewhat confusing (or deliberately misunderstood, depending on whom you read) scheme to “detect unlicensed use of its content.” Murdoch hit the same note yesterday: “We will be asserting our copyright at every point.”

On Tuesday, Chris Ahearn, president of Reuters Media, fired back at the A.P. and came out as a proud member of the Link Lovers: “I believe in the link economy.”

The Internet isn’t killing the news business any more than TV killed radio or radio killed the newspaper. Incumbent business leaders in news haven’t been keeping up. . . .

Blaming the new leaders or aggregators for disrupting the business of the old leaders, or saber-rattling and threatening to sue are not business strategies — they are personal therapy sessions. Go ask a music executive how well it works.

A better approach is to have a general agreement among community members to treat others’ content, business and ideas with the same respect you would want them to treat yours.

If you are doing something that you would object to if others did it to you — stop. If you don’t want search engines linking to you, insert code to ban them.

I believe in the link economy. Please feel free to link to our stories — it adds value to all producers of content. I believe you should play fair and encourage your readers to read-around to what others are producing if you use it and find it interesting.

The Link Lovers made another key acquisition last week, when NPR introduced its revamped site, with a stated goal of emphasizing “written reporting over audio reports” — as in free written reporting.

“I am a staunch believer that people will not in large numbers pay for news content online,” says NPR chief executive Vivian Schiller.

It’s almost like there’s mass delusion going on in the industry — They’re saying we really really need it, that we didn’t put up a pay wall 15 years ago, so let’s do it now. In other words, they think that wanting it so badly will automatically actually change the behavior of the audience. The world doesn’t work that way. Frankly, if all the news organizations locked pinkies, and said we’re all going to put up a big fat pay wall, you know what, more traffic for us. News is a commodity; I’m sorry to say.

If all the current and future members of team Pay Up! had a choice about who should be the head pinky-locker, it would probably be Murdoch, a man of maximalist ambition and success.

As Michael Wolff observes, “Owning the world’s biggest news business is exactly what he set out to do, and … that is pretty much what he achieved.”

There is, simply, no one who produces more news than Rupert. Quantity is what he does. On this basis and with this approach, he is now losing his shirt. But he cannot conceive of the world in any other sense than one in which his news outlets are not the most emphatic and powerful and lucrative.

Who else but Murdoch should lead the Pay Ups! in the great and glorious final battle against the Linkers? Charge!

I genuinely wish Rupert the best of luck. Quality journalism is a joy. I don’t want to lose it and I imagine many people re getting hooked on the free access. Hopefully, Murdoch will bundle his Times with his Wall Street Journal (Worth every penny), which every liberal should read just as every conservative should read this newspaper, which I also would not hesitate to pay for. Actually, an NYT/WSJ bundle, with my local Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, would be ideal. By the way, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette has been an innovator with its must-pay website.

I’m with the others on this one; judging from the comments I’ve seen at his sites, his “readers” are some of the vilest, most narrow-minded, bigoted and outright racist ignoramuses I’ve ever had the misfortune to encounter.

And after a good many years on the net, that’s saying a lot.

May this new incarnation of Hearst and yellow journalism fade rapidly into history.

I never read anything Murdoch online and never will. So, it does not any difference to me whether Mr. Murdoch want to collect some money.

If the Times starts charging for internet access, that would be a big deal for me. I never paid a penny while the Times had something like Times Prime (or whatever they used to call it). I missed hundreds of columnists’ deep thoughts but I survived. In the meantime, Times abandoned this ‘model’.

Good to know that Mr. Murdoch is for SOME innovations. As #1 writes, the fewer people read Murdoch’s stuff, the better…

The problem that Mr. Murdoch faces is that there is so much competition, providing comparable content, all for free. There is very little indication that those alternative news sources are going to change their business models. That makes Murdoch’s portfolio a tough sell to say the least.

And, regardless of what one thinks of Murdoch’s news portfolio, I can’t see a single compelling reason to choose his publications over others — much less pay for access.

If Rupert Murdoch’s goal is to be smaller but more profitable he may have his way — but likely at the expense of being much, much smaller and only slightly more profitable. That’s not a savvy business strategy when news outlets gain leverage based on readership.

Ultimately we may find that this fee-for-pedestrian content is a recipe for extinction.

As a blogger and news giver, I have just achieved in 12 months 24,500 visits and have found ways to direct traffic to my site. Though cashing in is another project which one could be done with percent payed advertisment based on visits per day (sliding pay scale from the advertiser) to the site. owner.
The problem I find with the news (N.Y. Times being the exception) is that all magazine,newspapers,blog news and T.V. News appears as if all have circled the wagons spew the same newsline (party line) and it seems contrived or delayed news for survival; A,”Custers Last Stand?”

He made his billions on selling trash to a gossip-loving public usually more concerned with the color of Beckham’s knickers and Diana Conspiracies than actual *news* reporting, yet he now wishes to parade about as the wise sage of journalistic integrity and the leader of a New Wave in online media.

He could, however, become just as successful at it as he has been with the slander rags The Sun and The Post, and here’s how:

Headline on front web page: “Obama is Illegitimate Son of Bin Ladin!”

What self-respecting wingnut goober wouldn’t pay to grab a piece of that?

Murdoch is smart — he knows instinctively, just like P. T. Barnum — there’s a goober born every minute who’ll believe anything and everything that promotes his/her love of self-reaffirming fear & loathing.

The only drawbacks I see are: 1. It’s much easier to drop a dollar into the hands of a street-hawk waving a glossy picture of Obama’s Gay Lover than it is to face that Visa bill each month for a Faux News on-line subscription. 2. Advertisers whose products are designed to appeal to Murdoch patrons might get angry (Rupe’s never been able to attract enough of the major sophisticated ads due to the demographics of his readers).

One positive thing I think such a move might provide is that it may tend to isolate the Murdoch Moon-Howlers from the rest of humanity, which is undoubtedly a good thing — especially when it makes it harder for my children to wander into headlines like: “Obama’s Toilet Habits Revealed!”

The buck stops with me! Rupert Murdock quote. Well it may stop with him but the buck begins with the public. First may I say that a glance through the New York Post is like stepping into Dantes Inferno or like falling into a sewage treatment facility. You think everyone cheats, steals, lies and kills. And for this you should pay? He is complicit in all that is wrong in this world because he promotes it by publishing it. Let him pay everyone to read it!

Good riddance Mr. Murdoch. You have a right to decide on your business strategy. We have the right to read something else. I love the NY Times, although I live far from its home base. Back in the early days when the Times decided to charge for online content, I stopped reading it and found more than one deserving alternative.

My dog nearly laughed me out of the room at this “news” and went on to ask what kind of stuff Mr. Murdoch has been smoking to: a) think people will pay for most of News Corps sensational online drivel, b) call the writings of his news reporting organizations “journalism”, c) listen to a confederacy of dunces led by O’Reilly et al, and d) read old news daily. The old mutt then grabbed his New York Times and stretched out on the chaise lounge to catch up on the news. Dean Corso

I agree, a good thing that Murdock will charge for his news. The more people who watch other less bias media the more informed people will be, especially in the US. On the few occasions I have had the misfortune to watch Fox news I have been appalled at what passes off as news or as informed critical comment. This is very unfortunate as the media has an important role in informing the public by the balanced reporting of events. I would have thought a well educated population like that in the US would have turned off watching media such as Fox news. I was informed recently that 60 % of Americans get their news from this media outlet. I just hope I am wrong or that people watch it for a laugh. So Mr Murdock please charge for your news coverage.

WSJ can charge for an online subscription because companies pick it up for their executives, and write it off on their taxes. And individual investors can deduct a WSJ subscription on their taxes. Absent that tax incentive, paid online circulation would drop substantially.

It’s some kind of obscene that WSJ can editorialize against the Cash for Clunkers program, which benefits the kind of peoplewho drive clunkers (lower income), while profiting from tax incentives benefiting its well-heeled readership.

Obama should look at cutting corporate welfare if he’s having trouble funding national healthcare. .

Was once a subscription member of the Wall Street Journal then Murdoch purchased the business. After 5 to 8 months under his control I dropped my subscription to the WSJ.

Murdoch has turned the WSJ into a New York POST with some financial information. The quality and depth of articles is gone, I’ve the old copies of the WSJ to compare the content.

Murdoch forgot or did not know that the reason people had paid to subscribe to the WSJ and/or the Online access to the WSJ was the depth of the articles. Boring to most but gave insight into the sectors of business many can and did work with to advance their specific needs.

The WSJ is no longer in existence.

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The Thread is an in-depth look at how the major news events and controversies of the day are being viewed and debated across the online spectrum. Compiled by Peter Catapano, an editor in The Times’s Opinion section, the Thread is published every Saturday in response to breaking news.